Soil resource availability is much more important than soil resource heterogeneity in determining the species diversity and abundance of karst plant communities

作者：Yuan Liu, Wenchao Qi, Danni He, Yunrong Xiang, Jinchun Liu, Huimin Huang, Miao Chen, Jianping Tao · 发表于：Ecology and Evolution · 年份：2021 · DOI：10.1002/ece3.8285 · 被引用次数：25 · 研究领域：Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies、Plant Parasitism and Resistance、Plant and animal studies

Resource availability and heterogeneity are recognized as two essential environmental aspects to determine species diversity and community abundance. However, how soil resource availability and heterogeneity determine species diversity and community abundance in highly heterogeneous and most fragile karst landscapes is largely unknown. We examined the effects of soil resource availability and heterogeneity on plant community composition and quantified their relative contribution by variation partitioning. Then, a structural equation model (SEM) was used to further disentangle the multiple direct and indirect effects of soil resource availability on plant community composition. Species diversity was significantly influenced by the soil resource availability in shrubland and woodland but not by the heterogeneity in woodland. Abundance was significantly affected by both soil resource availability and heterogeneity, whereas variation partitioning results showed that soil resource availability explained the majority of the variance in abundance, and the contribution of soil resource heterogeneity was marginal. These results indicated that soil resource availability plays a more important role in determining karst plant community composition than soil resource heterogeneity. Our SEMs further found that the multiple direct and indirect processes of soil resource availability in determining karst species diversity and abundance were different in different vegetation types. Soil resou...